1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electrical connector and lead wire cable assemblies, and more particularly, to an improved safety adaptor for attachment to a conventional male electrical connector housing.
2. Description of Related Art
In order to determine the electrical phenomena arising from physiological functioning of a patient, such as apnea monitoring of an infant or an electrocardiographic monitoring of a patient, it is necessary to electrically interconnect the patient with transducers or electrodes contacting the skin of a patient with a monitoring instrument, such as an electrocardiographic device. Numerous different arrangements of interconnecting cable and connector assemblies have been known in the prior art such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,632,121. This patent recognizes possible problems that can occur when a terminal pin is mounted in the wrong terminal bore and attempts to provide a configuration to insure proper mating of cable sets. Various suggestions have been made to modify a conventional lead wire connector housing with a molded pair of prongs extending adjacent and parallel to a male electrode terminal. The prongs are dimensioned to be sufficiently spaced apart to permit the male terminal pin to be connected in a female bore, for example, on a patient cable. The female connector housing of the patient cable must have a thickness less than the distance between the prong members. While this proposal addresses the safety problem for new instrumentation and new cable sets, it does not address the existing problem in conventional patient cables and lead wire connectors that are presently in use. Various examples of protective devices for male electrical plugs can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,060,297, U.S. Pat. No. 2,545,762, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,204,723.
The safety problems of using these conventional lead wires will continue to exist until the lead wires themselves are replaced. Thus, the problem remains in the prior art in improving the safety of conventional lead wires and patient cable assemblies.